Unbelievable Jeff

Valery playing for the u23’s is a weird one?

Not really, gets him some game time.

If Cedric is staying, he'll be first choice with a smattering of Valery.

Anyone reckon Heodt will stay and Ralph gets a tune out of him?

It's possible - he didn't look that appalling when he first joined, but I think that defensive genius Hughes really managed to set him back further...

Johnson caught lying again...this time over kippers.

 

MPs preempting ant attempt to suspend Parliament.

 

An early GE looking more and more likely.

 

Take a bow Margot James.

I asked Phillip Hammond about this last weekend, and he asked me to wait and see...I guess this is what he meant.

The idea was decent, the implementation was ****ing rubbish.

UJ, it DOES happen in real employment. I have had my contracts cut short, with both the contractual notice period and with no notice (despite the term). We'd probably give him compensation for loss of office ie. severance pay. Charlie should accept the club is under new ownership and management and accept revised terms or look to find a new employer himself. Digging his heels in and expecting the new club management to honour his contract is stretching his employment terms. In the real world, we can all be given notice. Only in football is there a "deal cannot be ended by employer" term.

And that's fine, but his severance pay would be the full amount remaining on his contract. It's like signing a 12 month FTC, with no option to give notice from the employer. As a contractor myself, I've had 2 week, 4 week and 3 month notice periods. On any of those, if they expected me to leave my role immediately I would expect full payment of the notice period - this pretty much what we are expecting him to waive.

That's the worst kit I have ever seen. Ever. EVER.

It must be a joke - there's regulations as to how big a sponsor can be on a shirt and that looks too big.

Just pointing out to you that it is impossible to infer anything from yesterday's team selections for the end of session kick-about.

I would say that a genuine ITK, making a comment like that, doesn't need to infer that much.

Like a child?

Like a bloke.

That’s a pretty fair assumption to deduce isn’t it?

 

 

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I don't think so - players have different fitness levels and the vast majority train to the level they are trained to - hence why we were so unfit under Hughes. If he wasn't training hard enough I would presume we'd have heard about fines being issued etc.

Do give over. He was told, as happens to many many players, that he doesn’t fit in to the managers plans - in January. He’s had plenty of time to sort a deal elsewhere, or he can sit on his contract. Don’t feel sorry for him, feel sorry for kids of 15/16/17 who get told they’re not being retained and don’t have his millions to fall back on.

Just comes back to my loyalty comment - it seems that we're more than happy to show no loyalty, yet when a player does the same he gets roundly criticised.

My point is that he has every right to sit out his contract - my issue is people criticising him for doing that.

In my experience, and it’s one of the few areas I can add any value to, genuine independent contractors will be ok, and end clients will flex to accommodate this.

So, do we still think clients will flex to this? It seems that a lot of companies are already saying they'll be going down the blanket route.

He’s perfectly entitled to stay and see out his contract, as long as he trains hard, conducts himself appropriately and is ready to play if needed.

 

What he shouldn’t do, is act like an unprofessional ***.

 

Unfortunately, I’m not sure he’s got it in him to behave appropriately.

Have we ever actually heard that he doesn't train well, or is this something that people assume because he's not that fit?

Whilst earning £40,000 a week before bonuses? Absolutely. I'd be over the moon. If I got offered £160,000 a month to move to Birmingham for 4 years my family and friends would all shout at me to **** off up north asap.

 

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What, even if you were earning £80k per week before bonuses where you currently live? That's very odd. I assume your family and friends don't like you very much if they'd encourage you to do that.

Some might say he's encouraging said derision by (subtlety) throwing a few toys out of the pram on social media...?

Because he's been frozen out and left behind. I'd be doing exactly the same as it's a pretty ****ty thing to do by Saints.

I think this is a little different that a standard job. You can’t compare someone earning millions (for hardly any work) to someone in a regular job. I don’t buy that capitalist viewpoint. It’s an obscene amount of money. You take the rough with the smooth. Nothing would induce me to have any sympathy for him. I’ll save that for people in real financial difficulty.

So you think it's reasonable for him to take a 50% paycut and move to another club because Saints have asked him to? And potentially have to move to another part of the company or spend large amounts of time living away from his family and friends?

People talk about the lack of loyalty in the game, yet I bet you lot were bleating at the first sign of Lallana and Van Dijk wanting out.

But he doesn't have to leave. He can stay and still earn the same money.

Yes, which is what I think he's fully entitled to do without being derided like he is on here.

Or “you are at an age where you will want to be playing regularly, we can’t give you that so you are free to spend the next few months looking at other options”

 

Of course the player would rather sit on his arse, watching the horse racing and watching his wages arrive in his bank account every week.

 

As some have said in the past couple of months or so he has acted like a ****. Shame.

"Thanks for your efforts, but we aspire to play above the level of pub football and need players who have more than 20 minutes of light jogging in the tank."

 

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See, neither of them seem to be saying "oh, and by the way, we will be freezing you out of the squad and make you train with the youth teams unless you agree to take a 50% paycut and **** off".

I know some people on this forum are of the "they're footballers, they're well paid so **** em" school of thought, but some of these people still have financial commitments that they rely on their contracts for.

Would you quit your job for a 50% paycut cos your company wanted to end your contract early cos they made a mistake hiring you? **** no.

Think some of you guys need a little perspective in life TBH.

I think we've treated him pretty badly myself.

"Thanks for your efforts, but find yourself a new club on less money as you've got no future here. Cheers."

Yep never mind that most contracts guarantee only a portion of a player’s salary. That is players can sign huge contracts but teams can then cut them if they are not performing and will only be on the hook for a small amount of money. See Donovan McNabb a few years back.

 

Frankly I have far more respect for a Le’Veon Bell (who was protecting his body in a position with a notoriously short shelf-life, knowing that the Steelers were going to run into him the ground and then likely move on from him) and Melvin Gordon (who has been playing on a depressed rookie contract and earning peanuts in relative terms) than any footballer who threatens to go on strike or demands a transfer despite having agreed to a contract and all the security it brings.

Absolutely, but it shows how little power these players have - and when you see what happened to players like Earl Thomas when they play on without those contracts it actually doesn't seem fair...there's a balance needed.

You obviously don’t know how US professional sports, especially the NFL are run then.

Indeed, it is extremely rare that players have any sort of power - if you look at what happened to Le'Veon last season, he's ended up on a worse team, on less money. Similar might happen to Melvin Gordon if he doesn't toe the line this season.

Fair enough. I'll visit you in prison.

Libel's not a criminal act, you plum.

You know less about law than you do the goings on at Saints.

This whole thread is potentially Libellous. Questioning the attitude of players .

Questioning it isn't. Asking a question is not libellous.

Surely you can see that having at least 12 unwanted players on our books earnings circa £32m a year is a bad thing and a bar to us bringing in other players and growing as a club? Frankly how that compares to other clubs is irrelevant, it's a fact that hampers out club and that's all that matters.

Having a smaller, better paid squad and ability to pay that bit more to players will obviously increase the quality of players available.

Only if it's untrue.

 

It's why I can tell you all about Boris Johnson, although even there it's difficult to find _exactly_ how many kids he's had out of wedlock, but it's a matter of record that he has.

 

The thing about football players is that they are living in the community and they do get observed by others. Osgood and Steele went to a pub near the university when I was there and certainly drank more than I did! I can't remember which of my friends told me he saw Jimmy Case so **ssed on a night out that he pee'd over a cashpoint. So although some reputations may be unwarranted there will be fans who have seen or heard things first hand.

 

I haven't so only comment about what I've seen on the pitch. Many years ago I saw a saints reserve side at Havant & Waterlooville, which is quite close to where I live, and they hoiked off one of our players for his attitude - you can hear a lot of what goes on on on the bench in those sort of games. For success you need a bit of attitude, but not the Nile Ranger sort.

Only a small aspect of a third hand story has to be untrue to be libel though.

I’d be careful posting ITK snippets on here mate. It’s not like the old days.

 

 

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I don't think it's called "ITK snippets", it's called "libel".